Grieving
by Bog-Burgling Camicazi
Summary: After the events of HTTYD2, Hiccup's worse than he's ever been. In attempt to snap him out of it, Valka feels she might have made it worse, for both of them.


**I dunno man, this little piece is kind of immature. I guess I'm kind of not at peace with what Valka chose to do. I don't really know. HTTYD2 spoilers, if that's still relevant. And plenty of OOCness to go around, I think. **

Valka could see what was happening to her son, he was slipping further and further into his own personal swamp of sadness.

Now that everything with Drago was done, there was no danger to occupy his mind, and the grief was free to set in. There was no denial, but that didn't help matters the slightest. His shoulders were always slumped and his slouch was always worse the next day. There was no more light in his eyes, and they were no longer the color of a lush forest. Instead they were the color of swamp water that was infested with leeches, leeches that were sucking the _Hiccup_ out of Hiccup.

Whenever he wasn't doing his chiefly duties half-heartedly, he was locked up in his room. She felt like he was taking this harder than she was and in reality, he probably was.

They had built a statue in honor of Stoick in hopes of cheering Hiccup up, but all it did was make him fly up there with Toothless every now and then and stare off into space.

And that was the _only_ time he flew with Toothless, which couldn't have been good for the dragon.

Astrid had tried, Toothless had tried, Gobber had tried, but he wasn't getting any better. These were the people he grew up with, and if they couldn't do it, she didn't know why they thought she could.

Still, here she was. About to knock on her _own son's_ door, and she was nervous about it. This wasn't how it should be. How had it become so dysfunctional?

Already, Hiccup was at the door. She didn't know if she knocked without realizing, or if he looked out a window or something, but she was not going to ask.

They sat together, where Stoick, Hiccup, Toothless, and often times Gobber, ate dinner together. Possibly not the greatest setting, but she didn't want to move him.

"Hiccup-" she started sadly.

"_I don't_," he interrupted. "I don't want you to do this. I don't want you to force me out of my little funk. It'll go, by itself."

"I don't want to take that chance," she told him quietly.

"Well, _I don't care _what you want," he spat bitterly.

"Hiccup! I am your-"

"_Mother_?" He finished for her. "Not for the past twenty years you weren't! I'm an adult now and it's too little too late to pretend to be my _mother_ now."

She didn't know what she was supposed to say, but she didn't let that stop her.

"Hiccup. I am truly sorry I wasn't there for your childhood. But I'm not pretending! I really do want to be your mother and I do want what's best for you. And- and distancing yourself from everyone you care about to be sad by yourself is not that!"

"What do you know about what's best for me? You only saw me for the first time, like, a week ago? How can you know _anything_ about me?"

"Hiccup, it wasn't my choice to leave. You _know_ that."

"But it was your choice to stay," he countered immediately. "You could have come back, right? If I hadn't accidentally run in to you we would have never met, right?"

Now there was nothing she could say. For a few weeks after she was taken, Cloudjumper wouldn't let her go _anywhere_. But in maybe a year after that? She could have easily convinced her companion to return to Berk.

"All those years of wondering why I didn't have a mother, of hiding under tables while dad had to leave me behind during raids, those years of neglect!"

"Neglect?" This was new.

"That's not important! The point is, you had your chance." He pushed back his chair, almost tripping over Toothless, who he hadn't noticed was watching. "Sorry, bud," she heard him whisper hoarsely.

After a while, she heard soft sobbing, and she knew it was her time to leave. Toothless could handle this better than she ever could.

Quietly, she left the house, knowing she won't be able to stop herself from coming back tomorrow.

**Well, I wasn't wrong about the OOC. I'm almost positive this doesn't happen after the movie, but what do I know?**

**Just that this doesn't happen. If anyone needs a definite happy ending: they make up! And Hiccup gets out his funk! And he proposes! To Astrid, I mean… ****_what did I do_****? **


End file.
